Alexandra Clement-Jones

• MSc, Environmental Technology, Imperial College London (Distinction)
• BA, Environmental Sciences, University of Michigan

Alex worked on the US Expanded Child Tax Credit (CTC), outlining approaches from 2021 that were successful in reaching new tax-filing families, and applying these lessons to help partners test actionable strategies in 2022. This work will inform strategies for the White House to test, and should contribute to the field more broadly in terms of sharing learnings to improve benefits delivery in the US.

She collaborated with Built for Zero and led the development of a new strategic direction through research, interviews, and analysis to establish a framework to assess the foundational elements communities need to reach functional zero on homelessness. This framework is informing Built for Zero’s work with 80+ communities and cities.

As part of a major philanthropy's sustainability initiative, Alex worked directly with four cities - Los Angeles, Chicago, San José, and Albuquerque - to support the implementation of bold climate goals across transportation, buildings, and renewable energy. She helped develop implementation plans to drive progress, define and track success metrics, solve problems with senior leadership, and facilitate cross-departmental workshops to address challenges.

Prior to joining DA, Alex was a Senior Climate Resilience Advisor for the City of Auckland in New Zealand, where she helped develop Auckland’s strategic direction on climate resilience and co-led the creation of Auckland’s Climate Action Plan. In this role, she led climate adaptation work, which established the evidence base for Council and Council Controlled Organizations (CCOs) to understand how climate change will impact Auckland. She built strong and lasting partnerships with Council teams, District Health Boards, and the CCOs, and oversaw the embedding of climate projections into all aspects of Council operations. She presented this work and held workshops in order to create a long-term, coherent narrative for climate resilience. 

At Arup, Alex led several C40 Cities Climate Leadership Group projects to help 90+ cities take bold action on climate change. She was one of the lead authors of a pivotal publication, Deadline 2020, which outlined what cities need to do to reach zero emissions by 2050. This report was adopted by all cities (90+) in the C40 network.